Valentina stared at the birthday card sealed in a baby pink enveloped that Sasuke had sent her "daughter" for her fifteenth birthday.
He always sent birthday cards and letters to Lily talking to her about his whereabouts and his experiences.

"Remember not to mention the card to your cousin Sarada," Valentina had reminded Lily earlier that day before she left to the Ninja Academy.

"I won't mom, but why doesn't uncle Sasuke send letters to Sarada as well?" Lily finally had the courage to ask what was obvious to everyone, but no one dared to speak of.

"Maybe he does, sweetie, but we just don't know," Valentina had assured her, but deep down she knew Sasuke had favoritism towards Lily; towards his brother's only child.
Valentina didn't blame him. Itachi was an amazing man.

Naruto's 32nd birthday had been last week and Sasuke did not show up for his best friend's birthday party. Only on Lily's birthday did the Uchiha return to Konoha.

"Don't open the birthday card from uncle Sasuke!!" Lily had called out as she ran out the door and made her way to Konoha's Ninja Academy.

Lily's statement caused Valentina to roll her eyes. Of course she was not going to open the birthday card. She was not paranoid about what was written on the card. What was the worse that the card could say? That Valentina was Lily's biological mother's murderer, not her mother?

She would prefer for someone else to tell the child the truth than to have to do it herself, yet everyone who knew the truth remained silent.
Nobody told Lily anything about her origin. Nobody wanted to be the one to do it. Valentina didn't blame them. She didn't want to do it either.

Valentina was awakened from her thoughts by a chirping sound, which directed her attention to her cellphone, which was on the kitchen's table.
The phone's lit-up screen flashed a text message from Lily's sensei, Konohamaru.

'Happy birthday to your daughter!! Might stop by later to drop off a gift I bought for her!'

Valentina quickly deleted his text message and turned off her phone . If she could block that man, she would in a heartbeat, yet the fact that he was Lily's sensei made it impossible.

Konohamaru had made it his personal mission to win Valentina's heart. There was nothing wrong with that except for the fact that Valentina was a widow. She was still mourning the death of a husband she never married. The death of a man who never loved her back.

It was embarrassing how Konohamaru would attempt to start a conversation with the heartbroken window every chance he could get. His attempt would only awaken her from her constant daydream of a life next to Obito.

Anyone who spared a glance at the single mother and widow would be able to tell that Valentina was mourning, but nobody was sure for who.
When asked why she never married, Valentina would only use the excuse that Lily was not ready to have a stepfather.

"Mom, my sensei is 27 years old and you're almost 32 in a month!! You're a mummy compared to him!!" Lily would often complained in private, whenever she would notice Konohamaru spending too much time staring at her mother, and Valentina used Lily's immaturity to avoid romantic relationships.
Nobody would ever be able to replace Obito.

"Hi Valentina!!!!" Karin placed gifts on the living room's table and made her way to hug Valentina.

It took all of Valentina's willpower not to cry in the arms of her redhead friend as she held her back and inhaled the scent of flowers from her friend's fiery long hair. "Hi Karin. Long time no see."

"How have you been, girl??" Karin casually pulled away from the hug and stared lovingly into the dark eyes of who was once a lonely anbu. "It's so good to see you again! I wish we could see each other more often!" Seeing Valentina only once a year was not easy for Karin. The time the two spent under Orochimaru's guidance and in Team Taka made her grow a strong bond with the once lonely anbu.

Valentina could only stare into Karin's crimson eyes for a few seconds before her fake smile dissolved. She was not having a good day. She was not having a good life. Maybe now that she is reunited with her childhood friend, she could confide this to her. Karin loved her, and would not dared to judge. "To be honest, I've been..."
Valentina's words came into a jolt as the front door opened for second time, and Suigetsu's white hair and tall figure stepped inside.

"Hi Valentina!!" His shark teeth revealed as he pulled his childhood friend into a hug. "It's been so long! How have you been??"
Suigetsu broke the hug and stood next to Karin before Valentina's arms could get the chance to wrap around him. The tension was obvious.

Everybody in the room knew that Suigetsu spent years being in love with Valentina before he started a romantic relationship with Karin. And only Valentina and Suigetsu knew of the phone call Valentina made him a few weeks after the Fourth Great Ninja War crying and claiming that she loved him and to please help her raise Itachi's daughter; Lily. The same phone call in which Suigetsu rejected Valentina's romantic advances and emotional manipulation.

"I've been fine." Valentina was left with no option other than to force a smile at the married couple standing in front of her. She did not dare to ask them how they were doing. They were happy, it was obvious. They didn't have the love of their lives killed in the Fourth Great Ninja War.

Karin and Suigetsu had been married for twelve years. Valentina assumed that something happened during the Fourth Great Ninja War that made both of them fall in love and quickly get pregnant the following month. They moved to Yumegakure, where they had and raised their son Mizu, and came to visit their niece, Lily, for her birthday every year.

Their 12-years-old, white-haired with red highlights son who resembled Suigetsu more than Karin locked eyes with Valentina as he entered Valentina's house and came into view.
"Hi, aunt." The boy was timid, cautious, almost as if he could sense the jealousy and bitterness radiating from Valentina. "I hope you are doing okay." It was obvious, even for the little boy, how heartbroken and hurt the woman hosting the party was.

"Thank you for coming." Valentina instinctively broke eye contact with the younger boy's crimson eyes, and pretended not to notice the worried glances from her childhood friends. "Lily sees you two as her favorite aunt and uncle." Lily also saw Karin and Suigetsu as her second parents, Valentina was aware of that.
Anyone would had been better parents to Lily compared to her.

"Where's my cousin Lily?" The moment Valentina dreaded came as Mizu continued the conversation with her.

"In school." Valentina desperately avoided eye contact with the young boy. It was not fair that her childhood friends fell in love and had a child while she was condemned to raise someone else's child. The child of a man who did not love nor care for her.

"Why did she go to school? When it's my birthday, mommy and daddy let me stay home." Mizu curiously looked for Valentina's eyes as her eyes looked everywhere except for his. The young boys desperately wanted to know why his aunt Valentina was not happy.

"She should be here in half an hour." Talking to kids was never Valentina's specialty, and it showed. Her words were straight to the point and her tone was cold. She hated talking to children. Having to raise someone else's child ruined the motherhood experience for her.

"Mizu go play outside in the backyard while the other kids arrive," Suigetsu instructed his son sensing Valentina's discomfort.

Valentina watched the young boy run outside and her stomach dropped. She hated grown up conversation as well.
She just wanted to disappear.

"How is Lily doing in school?" Suigetsu smiled at her trying to ease the tense atmosphere.

Valentina's eyes wandered to her living room's wall full of clocks.
They had this conversation every year since Lily's sixth birthday, yet Valentina always dreaded it.
"Lily is doing good. How about Mizu?" She forced a smile and secretly wondered if they realized that she hated pretending to be that child's mother.

"Mizu inherented my water jutsu and Karin's mind's eye of the kagura. He can sense any targets' chakra signature." Suigetsu looked like such a proud father, and Valentina couldn't help but wonder if Obito would have been a good father as well.

Obito. Obito. Obito. There wasn't a day that Valentina didn't think about him. Was she really about to turn her "daughter's" birthday into a day full of daydreaming about Obito? She truly was a terrible mother.

"Hello my children." Orochimaru and his son Mitsuki entered the house, each carrying a big cake and setting them on the Kitchen's table. The biggest one was white with baby pink frosting.

"Hey Orochimaru." Karin and Suigetsu hugged him as Valentina's eyes focused on the second cake which was decorated with blue frosting. The thought of putting rat poison on the second cake crossed her mind.
If she couldn't be happy, then nobody else should be.

"Hi, Valentina." Orochimaru hugged the once lonely anbu and felt her relax in his arms. "How are you, my girl?" He knew her well enough to know she needed everyone's emotional support for the day. Raising someone else's child was hard.

And not just any child.
Lily was the only child of the man Valentina loved and obsessed over for a long time. Itachi Uchiha's daughter served as a daily reminder that he never loved Valentina. Itachi could never love her, and Sasuke made sure to remind Valentina that every chance he could.

Valentina despised Sasuke for it, and she hoped he wouldn't attend Lily's 15th birthday party.

But he would.

Sasuke never failed to show up for Lily's birthday celebrations. She was his niece, and the sole attachment he had to Itachi, his deceased brother. Sasuke's sanity was retained by being kind to Lily.

Valentina needed everyone's emotional support for the day because Sasuke would attend the birthday celebration and make rude remarks concerning her, making her feel horrible.

"Mitsuki go play in the backyard...Where is my granddaughter Lily?" Orochimaru let go of Valentina's grip and looked around for the birthday girl.

"In school....shouldn't Mitsuki be there as well?" Valentina desperately wanted to be held again. She was not ready for the topic of conversation to be changed back to Itachi's daughter, when she hadn't even got the chance to tell her loved ones how she really felt.

"I let him take the day off. You know he always wants to be around Lily. I was afraid he might spoiled the surprised birthday party for her," Orochimaru explained.

Valentina walked away from the scene and entered the kitchen looking for rat poison in one of the cabinets. Suicide would not be scary if she was surrounded by people who loved and cared for her; Orochimaru, Karin, and Suigetsu.

"Is Mitsuki still having trouble making friends?"

"Sadly yes. That's one of the many reasons he follows his cousin Lily around school the whole time."

"Is Kabuto coming?"

"No, but he always sends a card and a big present to Lily."

They continued their conversation in the next room as if Valentina's absence did not impact them. Because it didn't. Everyone move on after the Fourth Great Ninja war. Everyone except for her.
Valentina couldn't help but wonder that if Kabuto would have been present, would he have followed her to the kitchen and somehow freed her from all of her obligations? What would it take to be freed from all of her responsibilities with that child that wasn't hers?

"Hi, good afternoon." Sakura's soft voice filled the house along with Sarada's laughter and Valentina wanted to cry.

"Hi aunt," the young Uchiha girl with red glasses found Valentina in the kitchen and greeted her with a tight hug.

"Hi Sarada." Valentina awkwardly froze as she hid the rat poison behind her back.

"Naruto should be here in a moment with his family." Sakura entered the kitchen to place the gifts on the kitchen's table. Both her and her daughter unaware of the rat poison Valentina was hiding behind her back. "I made sure that Sarada kept her mouth shut about the surprised party."

"Hello."

Valentina's stomach dropped for a second time as she recognized Sasuke's voice coming from the living room. She had prayed the night before that he wouldn't show up.

"Honey, I'm in the kitchen placing the gifts on the table." Sakura called to him and then her emerald eyes locked with Valentina's dark ones. "He was so happy to come. He missed you all very much."

Suigetsu was hugging Sasuke by the time Valentina entered the living room. "Sasuke my friend! When did you arrive to Konoha??"

"Just got back from the rain village half an hour ago. That village is so depressing," Sasuke faintly smiled at everyone in the room with the exception of Valentina.

"I bet." Suigetsu mumbled. "Who would want to be in a village where the sky is crying all the time?"

Valentina did. She wanted to drowned.

While Suigetsu was too busy talking to Sasuke, Valentina couldn't help but noticed Sasuke making continuous eye contact with Karin.

Sasuke continued staring as Karin forced a smile and proceeded to the kitchen to get the balloons for the surprise party. Sadness, betrayal, and possibly even love were all present in his stare.

Valentina wondered if Sakura and Suigetsu were aware of Sasuke's feelings for Karin.
Valentina wished she wasn't aware.

"Where's my niece?" Sasuke finally acknowledged Valentina's presence.

"In school. She should be out in a few minutes-"

Sasuke frowned as he glanced at Valentine's living room's wall, which was covered in clocks. "Get over your trauma, Valentina. I don't want you rubbing off your weirdness on my niece."

"Sasuke-kun!!!!!" Naruto abruptly running inside the house and hugging Sasuke eased the tension in the room.

"Hi," Hinata entered behind her husband and shyly greeted everyone. Valentina quickly helped the very pregnant Hinata carry gifts into the kitchen as she heard Boruto and Himawari voices back in the living room.

"Did Mitsuki come?" Boruto asked Orochimaru as soon as he saw him.

"Yes he's in the backyard playing," Orochimaru said.

"C'mon let's go," Boruto told his younger sister and Sarada. The three walked to the backyard.

Once again Valentina was alone with the adults. She looked out the window to the backyard wanting to play with the kids like a thirteen-year-old. Watching that everyone she grew up with had a family made her feel upset.
Valentina never married or got in a relationship. Her life solely revolved around raising Lily. Raising the daughter of Itachi Uchiha, the man who was her childhood love. Raising the child he had with a woman that wasn't her.

"It's almost 4pm. Let's start hiding," Orochimaru suggested.

Everyone agreed and chose their hiding spots. The attention fully on the front door waiting for Lily to walk in.

After minutes of pure silent, the side door in the kitchen was loudly open and then slammed shut.

Valentina quickly locked eyes with Orochimaru. Nobody ever used the side door.

Orochimaru signaled everyone to remained silent as he got up and walked to the kitchen to see who came in. Probably one of the kids or probably....an intruder.

After a few minutes, Orochimaru walked back into the living room looking very serious. "Valentina." He cleared his throat. "Would you come and join me in the kitchen?"

Valentina nodded as she got on her feet. "Be right back guys. Stay alert to see if Lily comes in."

Valentina walked into the kitchen with Orochimaru.
"Lily what are you doing here? Your uncle Sasuke has arrived from his trip. And your uncle Suigetsu and Aunt Karin came all the way here for your birthday-" she froze in her tracks.
In front of her sitting on a chair was Lily bleeding from her right eye.

Valentina took a step closer and saw that Lily had activated her sharingan eyes for the first time.

"Mom, we need to talk. Why didn't you tell me I was an Uchiha?" Lily's tone was loud and angry.

Valentina felt a knot in her throat hearing the question she dreaded to hear for a long time.